EUGENE HEALAN THOMASON (1895-1972)

Born in Blacksburg, South Carolina, but raised in a number of southern communities, chiefly Charlotte, North Carolina, Eugene Thomason began drawing and painting at an early age. After completing his primary education at Major Bard's private school for young men, he expressed the desire to move to New York to study art. His father, manager of the Piedmont and Northern Railroad, encouraged him to instead "do something practical" and enrolled him in the nearby Davidson College. A year later, in 1917, Thomason left school and joined the Navy.
After training at the submarine base in New London, Connecticut, he was assigned to the U.S.S. Pennsylvania in New York. In 1918 he received an honora...